Dr Drake frets that the advent of digital broadcasting equipment, which is replacing its analog ancestors, will result in far less radiation being beamed out into space. This will make earth nigh imperceptible, English snoozepaper The Telegraph cited Dr Drake as saying. Dr Drake is currently attending a discussion meeting on "The detection of extra-terrestrial life and the consequences for science and society", which is being hosted by the Royal Society. Nonetheless, mmankind has fed itself and the universe enough radiation as not to go undiscovered, Dr Drake said some time ago when the stars were not yet right.

Dr Drake has not yet described which car aliens will drive, when they arrive. Will they have chauffeurs?

Signal deterioration will rekindle the fiery, flaming discussions SETI researchers keep on having about whether it's a good idea to broadcast signals into space to show aliens we're here, or not. Some say attracting aliens will lead to the eradication and/ or enslavement and so forth of the human species, whilst others believe ET will be a benevolent, kind, enlightened and loving being, similar to the Dalai Lama.

One might suppose a benevolent entity were to wipe out the more civilised parts of the human race entirely in order to save the planet, feed the world (sans Bono and Bob Geldof) and putting an end to cultural achievements such as Tokio Hotel, however boffins are mostly nerds and will most probably show a tendency to think in terms of 80ies movies, instead of growing up and sharing the view of an average Lovecraft reader, which boils down to aliens giving as much a poo about humanity as humanity does to bed bugs, rendering all discussion pointless and futile.

I don't give a damn about SETI because I have better things to do than worry about aliens, like travel this awesome planet going to Tokio Hotel concerts. And you're wrong about aliens eradicating Tokio Hotel - don't you know the guys themselves are not normal Homo sapiens but rather Humanoids? LOLOL.

Dave Nunn - 28 Jan 22:06

If they are clever enough to get to earth and travel through space at unfathomable speed, possibly even bending time and space in order to do it.Then I'm pretty sure they would have the technology to find us, regardless of whether we send out signals...

Gallien - 09 Feb 06:59

Type "SERPO" or "zeta reticuli" in a search engine... or even "Groom Lake"...